The General Assembly Knows Better Than Silly Jurors: Big Pork Must Be Protected
On Sunday, state Representative Jimmy Dixon, a Republican from Duplin County, published a remarkable op-ed in the Goldsboro News-Argus. Reacting to the $25.1 million verdict that came down against Smithfield Foods Friday in the second of twenty-six scheduled hog-farm-nuisance trials taking place in Raleigh, Dixon, an unabashed Smithfield apologist, lashed out at the plaintiffs' lawyers (who are trying to "rape these families" and have "raped and prostituted" their clients) and Judge Earl Britt ("who doesn't have his thumb on the scales; his sorry ass is sitting on the scales!!!" [sic]).
Family farmers, he argued, were under attack: "We, the people must continue to rally and demand justice for the property rights of our hard-working family farmers ... and we must do it in the court of public opinion because we are damn sure not getting justice in Judge Earl Britt's courtroom."
For years, this is how Dixon and other Big Pork allies have framed the debate over the noxious odors and swarms of buzzards and pests that the mostly poor, mostly African-American neighbors of the state's hog farms have complained about: as the meager family farmer being beaten down by the greedy out-of-state lawyer who is willing to burn and pillage North Carolina's agriculture industry in his quest for lucre.
Only they, the brave souls of the General Assembly, stand in the way.
In 2013, about five hundred neighbors of farms that raise Smithfield pigs sued the company, alleging that the farms' method of waste disposal, which involves open-air cesspools and spraying liquefied waste onto fields, infringes on their right to enjoy their property.
Read more: https://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/the-general-assembly-knows-better-than-silly-jurors-big-pork-must-be-protected/Content?oid=15658164
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